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Authors:
Masland, S. R; Hooley, J. M, Tully, L. M, Dearing, K, Gotlib, I. H.Pages: 3 - 14Abstract: A considerable literature now shows that perceived criticism (PC) predicts clinical outcomes transdiagnostically. Recent work has begun to identify potential mechanisms underlying PC’s connection to clinical outcomes. For example, anomalies have been found in neural processing when individuals who rate their key relatives as highly critical listen to criticism. To explore whether high-PC individuals are also characterized by other processing abnormalities, we examined cognitive processing in a sample of community participants (N = 76) high or low on PC. We measured the executive control of attention when these two groups of individuals processed emotional information and interpreted acoustically presented ambiguous words. High-PC individuals showed impaired executive control of negative emotional information relative to low-PC individuals. They also made more negative interpretations of ambiguous words. These findings indicate that PC is associated with underlying vulnerabilities that may predispose individuals to develop psychopathology.PubDate: 2015-01-06T21:00:28-08:00DOI: 10.1177/2167702614529935Issue No:Vol. 3, No. 1 (2015)

Authors:
Cohen, N; Mor, N, Henik, A.Pages: 15 - 25Abstract: Rumination, a maladaptive self-reflection, is a risk factor for depression, thought to be maintained by executive control deficits that impair ruminators’ ability to ignore emotional information. The current research examined whether training individuals to exert executive control when exposed to negative stimuli can ease rumination. A total of 85 participants were randomly assigned to one of two training conditions. In the experimental condition activation of executive control was followed predominantly by the presentation of negative pictures, whereas in the control condition it was followed predominantly by neutral pictures. As predicted, participants in the experimental group showed reduced state rumination compared with those in the control group. Furthermore, trait rumination, and particularly its maladaptive subtype brooding, was associated with increased sadness only among participants in the control group, and not in the experimental group. We argue that training individuals to exert executive control when processing negative stimuli can alleviate ruminative thinking and rumination-related sad mood.PubDate: 2015-01-06T21:00:28-08:00DOI: 10.1177/2167702614530114Issue No:Vol. 3, No. 1 (2015)

Authors:
Muehlenkamp, J. J; Swenson, L. P, Batejan, K. L, Jarvi, S. M.Pages: 26 - 37Abstract: In this study, we experimentally assessed whether participating in online research about nonsuicidal self-injury (NSSI) may produce iatrogenic effects. A sample of 847 college students was randomly assigned to either an experimental condition (n = 439), in which they were exposed to questionnaires assessing NSSI, or a control condition (n = 408) that did not include NSSI questions. Immediate effects were evaluated with pre- and postmeasures, and 3 weeks later, 472 participants (68%) participated in a follow-up assessment of reactions, NSSI behavior, and urge to self-injure. Overall, results indicated that responding to detailed questions about NSSI did not produce iatrogenic effects immediately or over the follow-up period and may have contributed to positive outcomes. The positive findings largely held true for participants who reported engaging in different severities of NSSI behavior. There do not appear to be significant short-term adverse or iatrogenic effects of participating in detailed, online NSSI research. Implications for researchers and ethics review boards are discussed.PubDate: 2015-01-06T21:00:28-08:00DOI: 10.1177/2167702614531579Issue No:Vol. 3, No. 1 (2015)

Authors:
Onken; L. S.Pages: 39 - 44Abstract: The articles in this series relate to research on the modification of cognitive processes thought to be causally related to behavioral or emotional problems. The examination of the effects of targeted cognitive interventions on specific cognitive processes and of the relationship of the modification of these processes to clinical outcome provides insight into mechanisms of behavior change. In contrast to intervention development research involving clinical trials that focus on efficacy testing without examining an intervention’s mechanism of action, the intervention development research presented here is grounded in the examination of mechanism and can inform behavior change science regardless of whether or not an intervention exerts the hypothesized effect on clinical outcome. The potential for the utility of cognitive training interventions as clinical tools is discussed. Also highlighted is the potential for a mechanism-focused approach to serve as one model for progressive integrated basic science and clinical intervention development research.PubDate: 2015-01-06T21:00:28-08:00DOI: 10.1177/2167702614561512Issue No:Vol. 3, No. 1 (2015)

Authors:
Baskin-Sommers, A. R; Curtin, J. J, Newman, J. P.Pages: 45 - 57Abstract: Cognitive remediation is a treatment approach with the potential to translate basic science into more specific, mechanism-based interventions by targeting particular cognitive skills. The present study translated understanding of two well-defined cognitive-affective dysfunctions into novel deficit-matched interventions and evaluated whether cognitive remediation would demonstrate specific and generalizable change. Two antisocial subtypes, individuals with psychopathy and externalizing traits, are characterized by cognitive-affective problems that predispose them to engage in significant substance abuse and criminal behavior, culminating in incarceration. Whereas individuals with psychopathy fail to consider important contextual information, individuals with externalizing traits lack the capacity to regulate affective reactions. Training designed to remedy these subtype-specific deficits led to improvement on both trained and nontrained tasks. Such findings offer promise for changing neural and behavioral patterns, even for what many consider to be the most recalcitrant treatment population, and presage a new era of translating cognitive-affective science into increasingly specific and effective interventions.PubDate: 2015-01-06T21:00:28-08:00DOI: 10.1177/2167702614560744Issue No:Vol. 3, No. 1 (2015)

Authors:
MacLeod, C; Clarke, P. J. F.Pages: 58 - 78Abstract: Anxiety vulnerability and dysfunction are characterized by an attentional bias to threat. Cognitive training procedures designed to modify selective attentional responding to threat originally were developed to test the hypothesis that this attentional bias causally contributes to anxious disposition. The capacity of attentional bias modification (ABM) training to alleviate dysfunctional anxiety has since attracted growing interest, and the present article reviews studies that have evaluated this therapeutic potential. When intended ABM training has successfully reduced attention to threat, it also has reduced anxiety vulnerability and symptomatology with a high degree of reliability. When the delivery of intended ABM training has not resulted in such anxiety reduction, this typically has reflected the failure to successfully modify attentional selectivity as required. We discuss ways in which ABM training procedures may be refined to optimize their capacity to reduce attentional bias to threat, to improve delivery of the resulting anxiolytic benefits.PubDate: 2015-01-06T21:00:28-08:00DOI: 10.1177/2167702614560749Issue No:Vol. 3, No. 1 (2015)

Authors:
Collier, A; Siegle, G. J.Pages: 79 - 90Abstract: Depressed and dysphoric individuals predict negative outcomes more often than healthy individuals, and more frequently than positive outcomes. However, it is unclear if there is a causal relationship between negative emotional processing biases and depressive symptoms. We examined whether prediction-targeted neurocognitive training changed symptoms, behavior, and physiological reactivity to positive or negative feedback in euthymic and dysphoric undergraduates. Participants were randomized to a positive training intervention or neutral training. Among participants who received the positive training, pupillary reactivity to negative feedback predicted decreased symptoms and decreased after each session. Neither effect was present in the neutral training group. Both groups were more likely than controls to predict positive outcomes after training. Data suggested that change in a physiological mechanism indexing emotional reactivity and change in depressive symptoms during a targeted intervention may be related, and that it is possible, using psychophysiology, to predict which individuals will respond to neurocognitive intervention.PubDate: 2015-01-06T21:00:28-08:00DOI: 10.1177/2167702614560747Issue No:Vol. 3, No. 1 (2015)

Authors:
Lau, J. Y. F; Pile, V.Pages: 112 - 125Abstract: Anxiety disorders are common and impairing in childhood and adolescence. Cognitive bias modification of interpretations (CBM-I) training aims to alter information biases associated with anxiety disorders by training the person to endorse benign, rather than negative, interpretations of ambiguous situations. With an expanding evidence base, CBM-I training in childhood and adolescence may provide a key opportunity to prevent the development of anxiety disorders, particularly by capitalizing on the inherent flexibility of the adolescent brain to make durable changes. This article augments existing data with a reanalysis of a large sample of data (N = 387). The reanalysis highlights that CBM-I is (a) effective in altering interpretation styles; (b) that changes in mood state, although weak, are evident; and (c) tentatively, that effectiveness may vary across age in males and females. We conclude by offering further suggestions on which factors associated with protocol (e.g., multiple sessions) and training package (e.g., use of imagery) may maximize training effectiveness.PubDate: 2015-01-06T21:00:28-08:00DOI: 10.1177/2167702614549596Issue No:Vol. 3, No. 1 (2015)

Authors:
Joormann, J; Waugh, C. E, Gotlib, I. H.Pages: 126 - 139Abstract: Interpreting ambiguous stimuli in a negative manner is a core bias associated with depression. Investigators have used cognitive bias modification for interpretation (CBM-I) to demonstrate that it is possible to experimentally induce and modify these biases. In this study, we extend previous research by examining whether CBM-I affects not only interpretation but also memory and physiological stress response in individuals diagnosed with major depressive disorder. We found that CBM-I was effective in inducing an interpretive bias. Participants also exhibited memory biases that corresponded to their training condition and demonstrated differential physiological responding in a stress task. These results suggest that interpretation biases in depression can be modified and that this training can lead to corresponding changes in memory and to decreases in stress reactivity. Findings from this study highlight the importance of examining the relations among different cognitive biases in major depressive disorder and the possibility of modifying cognitive biases.PubDate: 2015-01-06T21:00:28-08:00DOI: 10.1177/2167702614560748Issue No:Vol. 3, No. 1 (2015)

Authors:
Bickel, W. K; Quisenberry, A. J, Moody, L, Wilson, A. G.Pages: 140 - 153Abstract: Contemporary neuroeconomic approaches hypothesize that self-control failure results from drugs annexing normal learning mechanisms that produce pathological reward processing and distort decision making as a result from the dysregulation of two valuation systems. An emphasis on processes shared across different diseases and disorders is at odds with the contemporary approach that assumes unique disease etiologies and treatments. Studying trans-disease processes can identify mechanisms that operate in multiple disease states and ascertain if factors that influence processes in one disease state may be applicable to all disease states. In this article we review the dual model of self-control failure, the Competing Neurobehavioral Decision System approach, the relationship of delay discounting to the relative control of these two systems, and evidence that the executive system can be strengthened. Future research that could result in more potent interventions for executive system improvement and potential constraints on the repair of self-control failure are discussed.PubDate: 2015-01-06T21:00:28-08:00DOI: 10.1177/2167702614541260Issue No:Vol. 3, No. 1 (2015)